[Letter on plain writing paper, no letterhead. Postmarked Port Hume, 14 November 1926. Addressed to T. McCausland, Esq., care of the Port Hume Clarion, 7 Ironside Street. In Ostermann's hand; a careful, deliberate script for a man of his generation. Preserved in McCausland's working file, folder marked "O. — when ready."]
Port Hume 14 November 1926
Dear Thomas,
You will remember I said at your mother's table in 1921 that I would find you when you were ready. I am finding you now, not because you are more ready than you were — I suspect you have been ready for some years — but because I am sixty-eight years old and my doctor tells me things I will not repeat in a letter, and there are certain matters I have been keeping in a private file since 1912 that I would rather give to a reporter than to a furnace.
I will say plainly what I am willing to say and what I am not.
What I will say, to you, on the record, in whatever form you require.
I opened an investigation file on the Thorpe matter in September 1919. I had it three weeks before Chief Royland called me in and told me there was no case. The file exists. It is in a tin box in my daughter's house on Elm Street. It contains: my own notes of my conversation with the nurse Pytel on the 14th of September, 1919; a copy of the dispensing ledger page from Pemberton's Drugs for August and September 1919, which a clerk at the pharmacy gave me on informal inquiry; and a note of my conversation with Dr. Linden on the 15th, which I recorded the same evening.
I will say that when Chief Royland told me to close the matter, I asked him directly whether the instruction came from above him. He said it came from where such instructions come from. I wrote that down too.
On the Iphigenia: I will say that in January 1913, the Harbor Police received a private communication from Mr. Reddick's office advising us that the Coroner's inquest had resolved the matter and that any further inquiry would be unwelcome. Chief Donovan — my predecessor — acted on this. I was a patrolman then. I noted it.
On the Prohibition arrangement: I will say nothing for the record. I have my reasons, which I will explain to you in person if you ask.
What I will not say.
I will not speculate beyond what I directly observed. I will not name persons I did not personally see act. I am a detective, or was one, and I know the difference between what I know and what I believe, and I will hold that line even in conversation with you.
What I ask.
Only that you read what I have before you print a word of it. And that you come to me, not to my daughter's house — I will suggest Café Solange, which has always been a discreet room — before you file anything.
I am sorry it has taken me this long. I told myself I was protecting the pension. That is true and it is also not the whole truth.
Yours, H. Ostermann
[In McCausland's hand, pencilled at the foot: O. called it. 15 years and he called it exactly. I will go to Solange on Thursday.]